sensorium

English

Etymology

From Late Latin sensōrium, from Latin sentiō (“feel, perceive”) + Latin -ōrium (suffix denoting a place for a particular function).

Pronunciation

• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /sɛnˈsɔː.ɹi.əm/
• (General American) IPA^(key): /sɛnˈsoɹ.i.jəm/

Noun

sensorium (plural sensoriums or sensoria)

1. (psychology) The entire sensory apparatus of an organism.
   • 1981, William Irwin Thompson, The Time Falling Bodies Take to Light: Mythology, Sexuality and the Origins of Culture, London: Rider/Hutchinson & Co., page 196:

     The continuum is broken, and the rise of writing helps to break up as well the continuum of the sensorium, to locate consciousness in the written word. What the written word is to the sensorium, the ego is to the entire consciousness, and the city is to the entire encirclement of nature.

2. (physiology) The central part of a nervous system that receives and coordinates all stimuli.
   • 1820, Henry Matthews, chapter VIII, in The Diary of an Invalid, London: John Murray, page 231:

     […] in all injuries of the spine whereby a communication with the sensorium is cut off, it is the parts below the injury which are deprived of sensation, while those above retain their sensibility.

3. (figurative) The brain or mind in relation to the senses.
   • 1714 July 9, Joseph Addison, editor, The Spectator, volume VII, number 565, page 36:

     Others have conſidered infinite Space as the Receptacle, or rather the Habitation of the Almighty : But the nobleſt and moſt exalted Way of conſidering this infinite Space is that of Sir Iſaac Newton, who calls it the Senſorium of the Godhead. Brutes and Men have their Senſoriola, or little Senſoriums by which they apprehend the Preſence and perceive the Actions of a few Objects, that lie contiguous to them.

   • 1760, Laurence Sterne, chapter X, in The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman, 4th edition, volume II, London: R. and J. Dodsley, page 67:

     The ringing of the bell and the rap upon the door, ſtruck likewiſe ſtrong upon the ſenſorium of my uncle Toby,—but it excited a very different train of thoughts ;—the two irreconcileable pulſations inſtantly brought Stevinus, the great engineer, along with them, into my uncle Toby’s mind […]

Anagrams

• Monsieurs, monsieurs

Latin

Etymology

From sentiō (“sense, feel”) +‎ -tōrium

Pronunciation

• (Classical Latin) IPA^(key): /senˈsoː.ri.um/, [s̠ẽːˈs̠oːriʊ̃ˑ]
• (modern Italianate Ecclesiastical) IPA^(key): /senˈso.ri.um/, [senˈsɔːrium]

Noun

sēnsōrium n (genitive sēnsōriī or sēnsōrī); second declension

1. the seat or organ of sensation

Declension

Second-declension noun (neuter).

	singular	plural
nominative	sēnsōrium	sēnsōria
genitive	sēnsōriī sēnsōrī1	sēnsōriōrum
dative	sēnsōriō	sēnsōriīs
accusative	sēnsōrium	sēnsōria
ablative	sēnsōriō	sēnsōriīs
vocative	sēnsōrium	sēnsōria

¹Found in older Latin (until the Augustan Age).

Descendants

• → English: sensorium

References

• “sensorium”, in Charlton T. Lewis and Charles Short (1879) A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
• sensorium in Gaffiot, Félix (1934) Dictionnaire illustré latin-français, Hachette.